The power of words in crisis communication

I recently got to share a stage with three rock stars of local government emergency management during a session of the SC Association of Counties’ Institute of Government. They did a great job sharing their crisis management experiences and best practices from hurricanes, floods and other emergencies.

Then, I got to talk about the power of words in crisis communication.

In a crisis situation, often what goes wrong from a communications perspective happens because public information is sometimes considered “in real time” function rather than a “planning” function. Planning should include not only charting logistics around communication but also knowing how to best use words to communicate calm and decisive leadership in a crisis.

The officials attending the meeting left with actionable strategies for communication response planning and “in the moment” checklists for everything from staging news conferences and tracking social media chatter to creating reporter lists and calming nerves before speaking.

But most importantly, I hope they left armed with some tools to help them communicate calmly and clearly on their feet in the face of an emergency.

A few of the tips we discussed included:

1 – Designate a communications liaison on the Emergency Management Team, especially if the county doesn’t have an official PIO.

2 – Make sure the comms liaison is NOT someone with another major operational role in an emergency (sheriff, department director, etc).

3 – Practice the public speaking part of crisis response training. Include this in your county’s regular tabletop exercises (get some tips in this article).

4 – Remember not all crisis situations will fall under the purview of the Emergency Response Team. Issues like leadership deaths or scandals, FOIA infractions or financial crimes will also require crisis response planning.

5– Monitor all types of media – not just the traditional tv stations and newspapers. Social media and bloggers play key roles in today’s media landscape. Designate someone on the comms team to monitor what’s happening on all platforms.

6 – Update your media list weekly. Yes. Weekly. Reporters move around a lot!

7– Identify locations for quickly organized news conferences. The checklist in this article gives a start to making sure all variables around audio, video and staging are considered and ready for deployment when needed.

All of these points and more are outlined in two articles I recently wrote about planning and carrying out crisis communication. As a bonus, I also shared my spreadsheet template for crisis communication planning. Download that here.

Got questions? I’m happy to chat.